Here's how we spent December

Well, the first half anyway.

We decorated our tree, and our children. It was lovely.

We took pictures for our Christmas Cards. Amazingly, this one did not make the cut.

Nate bought a flask. Don't ask me where, I have no idea, he tells me he plans to use it as a water bottle, so he won't have to waste so many of those pesky plastic bottles, in the meantime, he had his brother take about a gazillion pictures of him "drinking"....

...and the teddy bear drinking.....

.....and the kitten drinking....

.....really, there's nothing funnier than a cat drinking from a flask, right? Do you feel sorry for me? You should.

Ivy is now playing the flute and we had the pleasure of attending her band concert the week before Christmas Break.

She also played Mrs. Crachit in her class production of A Christmas Carol. She was very convincing. If I were Scrooge I would give that Bob Crachit some paid vacation days.

The first day of the break was haircut day.

Nate is probably not going to look as convincing with his flask now. Darn.

Merry Christmas to me!

Edge didn't get a haircut, I just like his shirt.

It's nice, don't you think?

Now that it's almost Christmas,

I thought it was about time to post some Thanksgiving pictures. 

A feat that would have been much easier if I had remembered to take any pictures on Thanksgiving. Most of these are courtesy of Misty, who "fortunately" NEVER forgets to take pictures.

We had pie.

I even COOKED!

I'm going to toss modesty aside to tell you that I made the best dressing of my life using the recipe tips I found here, then I'm going go out on a limb and suggest you all check it out and do the same next year.

Look!! It's Jon and me standing together.

(Merry Christmas MOM!!)

Edge and Wes are so cute aren't they?

Ivy and Ella seem to be under the impression that someone is going to serve them. Hahahahaha!

Wonder how long they waited?

Here you have a pack of boys. 

 Nate needs to work on his Blue Steel, don't you think?
(He also needs a haircut, but what do I know? I'm only his MOTHER?)

Here's Eli. 

He doesn't hate Thanksgiving, he wasn't feeling well, so naturally I HAD to take his picture.

I mean, who doesn't love to be photographed when they're sick?

The Next day we went out for a little Black Friday shopping.

Wesley and Jase just shopped their little hearts out. They were so determined to get the perfect gift for everyone on their list. 

It was touching.

And there you have it. Thanksgiving weekend in Arizona.

We rocked it.

After lunch Nate got kicked out of an antique store, but that's another story for another day.

Last weekend we took a vote and decided that visiting some Indian ruins sounded like the most fun thing EVER, so we loaded up and headed out on a little road trip.

Here you see Edge and Wesley presenting their classic road trip faces.

Nate's road trip face is intense yet hilarious.

Also hilarious are Nate's choice of hiking shoes.  He's a real outdoorsman. 

We call him Mr. Cabela.

We hiked....

...and we rested.

Eli and Nate ran ahead to scout out the situation. Nate was able to be the lead hiker because of his excellent choice in footwear.

Some people think it's funny to point off into the distance at NOTHING, then laugh when other people come along and ask what they are looking at.

We are obviously raising a bunch of clowns.

This is as close as we could get to the Indian ruins.  Not because they are sacred but because they are protected by evil spirits.......

......I mean, Africanized Killer Bees.

We took a picture anyway.

Then we went and drowned our sorrows in Mexican food. What else?

Soccer!

Saturday is soccer day around here. Ivy's games are first but since I'm coaching her (undefeated) team I don't ever get any action shots, but really, they all look alike so use your imagination.

Eli is the middle player in the red.

This week we took Annie and Emma with us to the game. They stayed like this until Brandon came along with french fries and distracted them. (Ella's game was on a different field at the same time.)

Catching up

A couple of weeks ago Hawthorne held it's prestigious Student of the Quarter awards ceremony.

Eli was honored with the Personal Success Award.

He would like to thank all of you who have helped make him the personal success he is today.

Friday Ivy's class went on a field trip to the Arizona Museum of Natural History, formerly known as the Mesa Southwest Museum, or as we unofficially refer to it, "That place with all the dinosaurs and you can pan for gold where the alligator almost ate Brandon that one time." (How many museums can offer the thrill of the Jurassic period, LIVE crocodiles AND the opportunity to strike it rich? Not too many I'm betting.)

I would like to thank Rylee's mom who chaperoned the field trip for making sure there were actually pictures of Ivy AND that they were in focus.

There is more, lots more, but Blogger is making it difficult for me to upload my pictures this morning.  I'll have to try again later. 

The sugar high promises to last through Thanksgiving

Whoever decided to have Halloween on Sunday this year really threw a wrench into our plan of bringing home 10,000 pounds of candy and taking over the world. We trick or treated our usual route on Saturday, about 2/3rds of the houses in the neighborhood were open for business and those houses seemed to feel like they needed to compenstate for their neighbors by handing out extra teats. Bonus! After it was all sorted and counted Ivy was pretty happy to inform me that she had collected 95 pieces of candy. (I'm guessing this count does NOT include the 35 pieces she ate to keep up her strength while trick or treating.)

Eli the Zombie.

Ivy the Bumble Bee.

Ella the Fairy.

 Brandon was a cowboy, the kind who refuses to let his favorite aunt take his picture. The charming kind.

Nate as, you know, just "a really cool guy". So, basically, himself.

Even the little kitty dressed up. Saftey first!! Don't worry, we didn't let her eat too much candy.

It's that magical time of year......

 Halloween!

 

Saturday we broke out the costumes and cobwebs.

Some people like to mix and match from the costume box. Here Eli is modeling your basic Viking Fairy with a twist of Michael Jackson. 

 

Our front porch and yard have been fully cobwebbed.....

 

 

.....and creepified.

 Before Brandon went home he begged me to give him a "Witch Finger" manicure. 

He likes to look his best.